Putting The Relationship First

I had no way of knowing what kind of confrontation was headed our way when my husband and I fell madly in love with our newest horse Cherokee. We caught site of him while browsing our humane society's website on the off chance they would have a horse available that would interest us. We've been looking at getting a second horse for the past several months but none have been just right. But there he was, and he even had his very own blog, after all he'd been with the humane society for two years and still no home to call his own.  The blog talked mostly about the training he'd been receiving over the past year and how willing he was to come along and how well he was doing.

We called the humane society immediately and even completed the online application same day, hoping that since it was soon to be the weekend we might be able to schedule a visit out to his foster home at the trainers. All went well and we were off to meet him and his trainer that Friday evening.

I spotted him from the road as we turned into the drive, he took my breath away. "Is that him?" I asked my husband as I rolled down my window for a less dusty view. I knew it was, the question was actually asking, 'Could he possibly be mine?' "That's him!" my husband confirmed, and I could hear the same emotion in his voice that I felt in my heart. He was magnificent. A dark bay, with thick mane, grazing among the tall grass alone in the large green field.

The visit was long and yet passed quickly. His trainer rode him and lunged him and then invited me to do to the same. I wasn't as keen on the lunging, and this should have been at least a tinkling of a bell, if not a full on red flag that there would philosophical differences to come. But when in Rome.... The problem I had was that she drove him constantly, waving the whip and hitting the ground, pushing his hindquarters forward without end. There was absolutely no 'allow'. I just could not drive him like that, I wanted to see where he'd go on the ask and more importantly where he would stop, but she did not know where my mind was or the why of it so she just belted out her instructions to, "keep after him."   I hated it, but I already loved him. I dropped the point of the whip down and sent him a secret invitation to turn in to me, if he did then surely she wouldn't insist that I send him back out. He did, and she didn't.  I was smitten!

I rode him briefly. I was already getting that too tired feeling you get when you have too much emotion running through you, and in this case it was a combination of joy and hope and all the level-headed reminders to not get too attached. Before I dismounted I looked down at his trainer and asked her if she felt this was a good match. She seemed genuinely convinced that it was and said as much.

[now i can only summarize here the sharing of information that took place during the visit prior to my asking essentially for her blessing and support for us to adopt him. the short story is that he had been essentially an abandoned stallion left to fend for himself within his stallion sibling herd, some emaciation-starvation and very little human bonding. So he has only been gelded for the past two years, perhaps just shy of that, and that there would be some stallion tendencies in his behavior that would need to get worked out, and that he had, in fact, had one adoption home where he threw the rider, resulting in an injury and he was returned to the humane society ... likewise we shared with her information about our current horse family which consisted solely of Sundance, a horse that came to us in much worse behavioral shape than this horse a year and a half ago. We explained that we were not currently riding Sundance that he had only recently reached a level that we were comfortable starting and had only recently started tacking him for groundwork. And, we made it very clear that we were following Parelli training methods. I did not think that we held anything back nor tried to represent ourselves any differently then where we were, and because her website said that she was a practitioner of Natural Horsemanship I assumed we had her full support and understanding of what working a horse through Parelli would mean.]

Congratulations are in order at this point because we were approved after our home visit. We went to the humane society office to discuss our current situation which included a barn with it's midsection recently demolished for a new stall, it would be no less than three weeks before we could bring him home. What could we do to ensure that he was ours? Well, they were so happy with Cherokee's adoption that they assured us that we did not need to pay them any of the normal $300 adoption fee/donation and there would be absolutely no problem with the time line. We still gave them $100, thanking them for their kindness, overall everything about adopting Cherokee was feeling so positive and supported by all.

I had been thinking about the trainer and wondered if she had gotten the news about Cherokee's adoption, I wanted to see what could be worked out for me to come and visit him there. When I reached her, she did not sound at all happy. She said she had just found out. To me she sounded terribly disappointed and this took much of the energetic wind out of my sails... (I'm an uncontrollable em-path and someone else's hurt never fails to translate directly into my bones).  Much more subdued from my enthusiasm just moments ago, I asked her if Don and I could come and visit with him the following day and of course that was acceptable.

When we arrived she was riding him, fairly hard around the arena, when she made the first pass by us she said that he'd been misbehaving and needed to be worked out. We were a little bit taken a back, so many logistics that we just hadn't thought of yet! But we accepted it just fine, this was his current home after all, and I had only the night before realized there was perhaps more than just a trainer relationship between her and Cherokee. I felt bad for her and I wanted to do whatever I could to win her over and show her that he really was going to a great and caring home... perhaps the very home that he had to wait for two years to find him. So, I asked her if she 'gave lessons' (knowing of course she did), when she confirmed I said, well what would you think about me signing up to take lessons from you while he stays her with you? That way I can get to know him better and be respectful of your time and care for him while he here. She agreed, and I wish I could say she agreed with enthusiasm but it wasn't, and it wasn't an emotion I could read so I blindly committed.

There are some moments in time that you can clearly rewind back to, and that  play over and over again in your mind. I have done that more times in the past five days then I care to count anymore. If I could go back to that moment in time... I'd stop myself before asking her that question, and before committing to 'take lessons' from her and I'd even stop myself from feeling sorry for any regret or hurt feelings she was having.  We should have simply said hello to Cherokee, asked her if there was anything she needed for him and said we'd see her in three weeks when we come out to pick him up to bring him home.  As foriegn as that would be for me to do... that is what we should have done and spared all of us the stressful events of the past five days that are still not completely on the mend and now, still remaining before us are two very long weeks.

And that brings us to the here and now and present moment. I am purposefully omitting the disappointing details of the events that have occurred since last Thursday (five days ago). I'll summarize it by saying, I did come to her for lessons, and she could not let go of Cherokee, and insisted that my own methods where inadequate to handle him and that in fact Parelli training methods are disastrous. We have not had any problems with Cherokee, nothing significant in anyway so these verbal attacks were initially shocking. But I  knew where she was going with it... if she could get me/us to believe that Cherokee was simply beyond us she would have her second chance of owning him.  She has tried many tactics, and I believe that she may have even tried to convince the humane society though I can only make an assumption about that based on her comments to me. I have continued to go and to interact with her, graciously as I can be, trying to connect with some side of her that will help her stop this disastrous behavior. But even still, she is being somewhat successful, this is coming between me and my attempts to bond with Cherokee, it is making me want to stay away from there, but I won't give up and we certainly won't give up on him.

And so the journey begins here, we are waiting to bring our boy home. We are putting the relationship first, allowing him to stay in the home that he knows, we will continue to seek peace and support from the trainer, we will not get the chance to bond and work with him as much as we had hoped before he comes home, that is okay. This is the place and I can come to each day... knowing that each day we're getting closer. I wish there was some way to 'blast' this blog out into the world quickly, I want to be sharing this experience with others, I want to have readers who get to see the process and progress and happy ending who have been here from it's otherwise challenged beginning. But as with all things I do, we just have to mind the words of Pat Parelli and let it, "Take the time it takes."